The vicissitudes of metaphysics in the Modern Age

Abstract

Following Hans Blumenberg and others, an account is given of the coming about of Modernity and of its major characteristics. The aim of the paper is to show that, from the very beginning, a restricted number of philosophical reactions are developed towards the phenomenon of Modernity. These reactions are represented in the major ‘modern’ philosophers: Descartes, Spinoza, Hume (and Kant) and French Enlightenment thinkers (as, e.g., Condorcet). These major reactions repeat themselves mutatis mutandis well into the 20th century. The paper ends with a brief discussion of the possibility of (modern) metaphysics at the present moment.